(a) Technical Field
The present invention relates to a clamping device for a vehicle body transfer cart. More particularly, the present invention relates to a clamping device for a vehicle body transfer cart, in which a rotation unit, an air supply unit, and an electrical signal unit are installed in a single processing device such that rotation, air supply, and electrical power supply operations are performed in a single process, thus simplifying the structure of the device, reducing the number of components to save manufacturing and installation costs, and simplifying the structure and reducing the weight of a cart unit for the clamping device.
(b) Background Art
In general, in order to weld or assemble various components to a vehicle body using a robot in a vehicle production line such as a vehicle body assembly line, the components are held by a clamp or set to a jig to perform a welding or assembly process.
Since such clamps or jigs have different shapes according to shapes of, e.g., inner panels or outer panels of vehicles, they should have different shapes according to the kind of vehicles.
Meanwhile, most vehicle manufacturing companies do not produce a single kind of vehicle but produce various kinds of vehicles to meet clients' tastes. It is thus necessary to provide an equipment that can satisfy all kinds of vehicles, but it would impose a heavy economic burden on the companies.
Accordingly, it is advantageous to provide an equipment that can be commonly applied to many kinds of vehicles, if possible.
Like this, vehicle body processing systems, which perform electrical power supply and air supply operations in different rotation types and manners according to the kind of vehicle, are built on the vehicle body assembly lines.
As a conventional technique related to a clamping device of a cart for transferring a vehicle body, Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 1994-183343 discloses a power coupler including an electric power supply unit and an air supply unit.
Moreover, Korean Utility Model Registration No. 425,970 discloses an apparatus for driving a vehicle kind converting unit in a production line for various kinds of vehicles.
However, the conventional techniques have a problem in that the electric power supply, air supply and rotation operations are not performed in a single process for a cart unit.
The problem of the conventional clamping device for the vehicle cart will be described in detail with reference to FIGS. 1 and 2.
FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram of a conventional clamping system for a vehicle cart, and FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of an air supply device in the conventional clamping system for a vehicle cart.
As shown in FIG. 1, a rotation unit, an air supply unit and an electric supply unit are installed in each of a plurality of processing devices 100, 110, 120 and 130 with respect to a cart unit. Accordingly, four rotation units 140, an air supply unit and an electric power supply unit are required in each cart unit.
Accordingly, in the conventional clamping system, the space for the installation of the plurality of devices is increased and the burden of the transfer device is increased due to the excessive weight of the cart unit.
Moreover, as depicted in the air supply device 130 of FIG. 2, a connection sensor 150 for detecting whether or not a cylinder is clamped and a transmission coupler 160 are established in each processing device, thus complicating distributing wires. Furthermore, since a dog bracket sensor 170 for detecting the kind of vehicle is mounted on four surfaces of each device, various kinds of sensors are required.
In addition, since an air supply cylinder 180 for supplying air is mounted on one surface of an air receiving unit of each device, the number of air supply cylinder 180 required is also increased. In the case where the kind of vehicle to be processed is added to utilize the space of each device, the respective devices may interfere with each other.
As a result, the conventional clamping device for the vehicle body transfer cart has problems in that the structure is complicated due to the increase in the number of the components and it takes a lot of time to design the device due to the complicated structure. Moreover, the manufacturing cost is increased due to the increase in the number of the components, it is difficult to maintain and repair the device, and it occupies a large assembly space.
The information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the background of the invention and should not be taken as an acknowledgement or any form of suggestion that this information forms the prior art that is already known to a person skilled in the art.